Timo Glock says the progress Marussia made throughout 2012 as a result of its windtunnel collaboration with McLaren is encouraging for the team.

Marussia struck up a technical agreement with McLaren in 2011 that included the use of the team's windtunnel, and despite struggling early on last year due to the late launch of its car it was battling with Caterham in the latter stages of the season.

Despite Vitaly Petrov's 11th place in Brazil ultimately snatching 10th in the constructors' championship away from Marussia, Glock believes the signs have been encouraging ever since the team started working in the windtunnel.

"I think the windtunnel work paid off since we went to McLaren, and that looks very positive for the future," Glock is quoted as saying by Autosport. "It was a difficult year in 2012 with a very difficult start; going to Australia with no testing. But I think since then we've improved the car quite a lot.

"I didn't think that we would close the gap again because we were 1.5s off Caterham [on race pace] and then closed the gap very quickly over the second half of the season, which is great."